Critical Literacy

I believe that critical literacy enables students to be able to critically analyze text and understand them completely.  Text are not always straightforward and I think that critical literacy provides students with the skills to take underlying information from the text.  By actively reading and reflecting, students are able to understand better. If students are able to participate in critical literacy, the skills they will develop will help them to be able to take more from text, therefore expanding their knowledge.
I read the article by Behrman as well as the article  by Monahan that pertains specifically to science.  Both of these articles gave me great ideas on how to incorporate critical literacy into my discipline, as well as its importance.  Starting with the Monahan article, I would love to do a project like the students in her classroom.  Students were divided into groups and were asked to construct arguments in which they utilized voice.  I think an activity like this would be very beneficial to students in science because it allows them to bring their own ideas into science.  In one of my classes in college our professor assigned us a similar project.  We were given an article to read and using what we have learned in class we were asked to analyze the article.  Our teacher wanted us to use our own voice and argue reasoning behind the article.  It was difficult at first, but after some practice it became a lot easier and enjoyable.  I would love to do something similar to this for my students. I think too often science is looked at as just boring memorization which is not at all the case!  I think activities such as this help students to realize the science is a way of thinking.
In the Behrman article, six critical literacy approaches are discussed: reading supplementary texts, reading multiple texts, reading from a resistant perspective, producing counter-text, using student-choice research projects, and taking social action.  I hope in my future classroom I can finds to incorporate all of these approaches.  After reading, one idea I had mirrored the example given in the reading.  In the example, students read two versions of a fairy tale and then compared and contrasted them.  They then wrote the fairy tale from a different perspective.  I would love to find a way to do this with different theories or different views of popular research topics.

Digital Text

For my digital text I chose to make a Twitter account.
https://twitter.com/mskfarr

The set up was very user friendly and I didn't run into any troubles when trying to set up an account.  When looking to find profiles to follow, I simply started by typing things in I know I would be interested in following.  For example, I searched UEN and the Utah State Office of Education.  Once I started following these sites, Twitter began making suggestions for other organizations I might be interested in following.  From there I was able to expand my list of people I'm following rather quickly.  I have not yet tweeted anything, but I have found some very interesting reads and information from profiles I'm following.
I think Twitter would be a great resource in a classroom.  When I was in high school and right when I started college Twitter was a pretty new thing.  I had a few teachers try to use it, but they didn't get the participation as it wasn't very popular.  Now Twitter is pretty much a household term, especially for students who are part of the younger generation.  Having a classroom Twitter would be a great opportunity to send reminders to students about upcoming homework assignments or tests.  Also a Twitter account could be useful in providing students with additional resources or interesting articles related to the things we are talking about in class.
For my students, I might suggest for them to make a Twitter account and follow profiles of college or career fields they are interested in pursuing.  Having access to these type of resources might help them determine what they would like to do post-high school.  In order to do this, I would print out a step-by-step instruction sheet and give suggestions to things they might follow.  This is definitely not something I would force students to do or put a grade on.  I know some students might not have access so smart devices, and their parents might not allow them to have a Twitter account.  I could even write a short note home to parents discussing educational benefits Twitter could have as a resource in our classroom as well as for their student's interests.

For the reading, I chose to read the journal article discussing NASA's Twitter account.  I thought this was such an interesting read, which is one reason I chose to do a Twitter account as my digital text.  The article breaks down techniques that NASA uses to apply scientific literacy to a wide audience with diverse backgrounds and knowledge.  After reading this article, I really can see how Twitter can be a beneficial resource for my classroom.  Social media is second nature for students, and utilizing this fact in the classroom will be so much more beneficial than trying to completely restrict it.  I like how Twitter provides students with opportunities to participate in real-life events, like NASA does.  I also liked the suggestion made by the article of using Twitter to join in dialogues of current events and use it to find answers to their questions.